The observation is very worrying. And it is raised by those who are at the forefront of the fight. Drug trafficking is thriving like never before in France and the violence it generates has reached a record level in 2023. “The threat has reached a historically high level,” described the head of the Anti-Narcotics Office (Ofast), Stéphanie Cherbonnier, bluntly at the end of the year. No territory is spared. »
Fueled by strong demand – 5 million regular users of cannabis, 600,000 of cocaine, according to the French Office of Drugs and Drug Addiction (OFDT) – the national narcotics market produces an annual turnover estimated at 3 billion euros. . In mid-November, the police had recorded 315 homicides or attempts between criminals linked to drug trafficking, an increase of 57% compared to the same period in 2022.
Marseille, Nantes and Nîmes plagued by drug trafficking
And still according to Ofast data, 240,000 people live directly or indirectly from drug trafficking in France, including 21,000 full-time. The products have high profitability for criminal organizations. “Cocaine is bought between 28,000 and 30,000 euros per kilo and resold between 65 and 70 euros per gram,” Stéphanie Cherbonnier further detailed.
In Marseille alone, the war waged by two competing criminal organizations for control of the lucrative drug market has left 47 dead since January 1, most of them “small hands in trafficking”. Other cities are plagued by this violence: Nantes, Besançon, Toulouse, Avignon and Nîmes have experienced their share of settling of scores this year.
To wage what he calls “the mother of all battles”, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has not skimped on the means to “shell” the deal points and try to destabilize traffic. But the task is titanic. “We sometimes have the impression of emptying the ocean with a teaspoon,” confides an investigator based in Normandy, “it’s frustrating because the people we question are always very quickly replaced by other little soldiers. »
“An undeniable desire to physically eliminate competitors”
But in this dynamic market, fueled by “increasing production” and “strong diversified demand, particularly for synthetic products”, competition is fierce and justifies the use of force. “There is an undeniable desire to physically eliminate competitors,” notes the head of the Central Office for the Fight against Organized Crime (OCLCO), Yann Sourisseau.
In the past, recalls an investigator, territorial disputes ended in “intimidation shots on the facades of buildings” or “with pickaxes”. From now on, commandos equipped with weapons of war no longer hesitate to “burst” in the middle of the street. To describe these operations intended to “mark with terror” its rivals, the former Marseille prosecutor Dominique Laurens invented the term “narchomicide”, a contraction of narcobanditism and homicide.
This indiscriminate strafing, far from “old-fashioned” score-settling, has increased the number of collateral victims. Symbol of these innocent victims: little Fayed, 10 years old, killed at the end of August in the Pissevin district of Nîmes. His death, aboard his uncle’s car caught in a shootout between rival gangs, aroused great emotion.
Young little soldiers
The little soldiers of this murderous war are also young, whether they are “chouffes” (lookouts), “charcleurs” (sellers) or “charcleurs” (killers). Of the 450 victims identified in 2023 by the police, “30% are under 20 years old”, recently noted its general director, Frédéric Veaux. And “20% of authors are between 16 and 19 years old”, according to OCLCO statistics. Among these assassins, Matteo, 18 years old. Arrested in early April in Marseille, he is suspected of having shot dead Djibril, 15, and Kaïs, 16. He claims to have received 200,000 euros in remuneration for the “contracts” he allegedly executed.
Faced with drug traffickers, police officers, gendarmes, customs officers and magistrates battle step by step. In 2022, seizures broke a new historic record with more than 157 tonnes intercepted, with cannabis (128.6 tonnes) and cocaine (27.7 tonnes) in the lead. But they only concern a small part of the volumes in circulation. “Seizures are increasing but this is nothing compared to the profits of drug trafficking,” recently noted the Paris prosecutor, Laure Beccuau.
On the violence front, 83 homicides and attempted homicides were resolved in 2022, i.e. a elucidation rate of 30%, and 123 perpetrators indicted and imprisoned, records the OCLCO. Last year, “8,000 weapons were seized, an increase of 10% compared to 2021, including 25% during investigations into drug trafficking,” adds Stéphanie Cherbonnier. But the observation remains: despite all-out repression, trafficking continues to grow, with its sinister procession of violence.
Under the sun of Morocco, Algeria and especially Dubai
“Even severe penal policies do not deter” traffickers, recognizes the Bouches-du-Rhône police chief, Frédérique Camilleri. “They are going to prison for thirty years and that doesn’t deter them. » So some already fear seeing the situation get out of hand like in Belgium or the Netherlands, where drug mafias corrupt, eliminate and no longer hesitate to threaten ministers…
In September, around fifty local elected officials demanded a “national and European plan” against the trafficking that is plaguing their neighborhoods. “It is time to break this infernal spiral of violence resulting from trafficking,” they wrote in a column published in The world. Jumbled together, they recommend “more resources”, a “sustainable health policy” to “fall demand” or to “fully attack the traffickers’ wallets”. But tracking down the heads of trafficking runs into the pitfall of judicial cooperation. “The drug lords (…) have taken refuge in a certain number of countries where extradition processes are today interrupted,” summarized the Paris prosecutor, Laure Beccuau.
Under the sun of Morocco, Algeria and especially Dubai, they launder their money and continue to manage their networks. Even if, officially, ties with the emirate have improved in recent years, difficulties persist. “Police cooperation works, the problem is afterwards,” laments a senior Parisian magistrate. “Marcassin”, “The Professor”, “Bison”, several network heads sought by France have been arrested in recent years in Dubai. But to date, only two have been extradited, Hakim Berrebouh and Moufide Bouchibi. Others were released by Emirati justice.
“When France sees fentanyl arrive, it will be something else! »
“The legislation is not the same in Dubai. They have extremely rigorous formalism,” says Stéphanie Cherbonnier, who has high hopes for the arrival at the start of the year of a French liaison magistrate in Dubai. Magistrates and police officers are also calling for strengthening the fight against financial profits generated by trafficking, against their laundering and corruption, in particular by developing seizures of criminal assets. “We must continue to attack the fuels of serious organized crime,” summarized prosecutor Beccuau.
And today, the authorities are worried about an “explosion” of the market for synthetic drugs, in high demand by young users looking for increasingly high levels of toxicity. And monitor the emergence of synthetic opioids. “The Americans keep warning us: when France sees fentanyl arrive, it will be something else! », Already anticipates magistrate François Antona, head of the section responsible for the fight against organized crime (Jirs) at the Paris public prosecutor’s office.
On the ground, those who fight drug trafficking on a daily basis are under no illusions. “It’s an endless war, it’s clear that we won’t stop the trafficking,” summarizes the Normandy investigator, “but it’s our job to try to disrupt it, sometimes to dismantle it.”